1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an optical pointing device, and more particularly, to an optical pointing device, an optical pointing system, and a method of operating the same capable of recognizing a specific pattern to generate a button selection signal.
2. Description of the Related Art
An optical pointing device is a human interface device connected to a computer for processing a user's input, which is capable of providing a movement value of the optical pointing device to the computer to move a pointer displayed on a computer screen.
Such an optical mouse further includes a plurality of buttons for processing a user's input. When a user pushes a certain button, the optical mouse transmits a button selection signal corresponding to the pushed button to the computer, and the computer performs an operation corresponding to the pushed button.
The optical mouse generally has two buttons. When a user pushes one of the two buttons to provide a first button selection signal, the computer points or selects certain data. When a user pushes the other button to provide a second button selection signal, the computer performs an operation for setting data properties.
However, the optical mouse has been provided with more number of buttons in order to increase convenience of use.
For example, an optical mouse includes an additional button in addition to the two buttons. When a user pushes the additional button to provide a third button selection signal, the computer scrolls a screen up or down in response to the movement of the additional button.
For another example, an optical mouse includes at least four buttons to use as a hot key for executing a specific application program. That is, the optical mouse provides a plurality of button selection signals, and the computer sets a plurality of commands for executing specific application programs corresponding to the plurality of button selection signals of the optical mouse, similarly to hot keys of a key board. When a button selection signal is received from the optical mouse, the computer executes a command set to the received button selection signal.
Therefore, the optical mouse has more number of buttons so that a user can simply drive many operating or application programs using the optical mouse.
FIG. 1 illustrates an optical pointing system including an optical mouse for providing a plurality of button selection signals and a computer for performing operations in response to the plurality of button selection signals.
Referring to FIG. 1, a conventional optical pointing system includes an optical mouse 2, and a computer 3. The optical mouse 2 includes an image sensor 21, an A/D converter 22, a movement value calculator 23, a button part 24, and a communication part 25. The computer 3 includes a communication part 31, and a main controller 32.
Hereinafter, each function of the components of the optical mouse will be described.
The image sensor 21 is disposed on a work surface (a mouse pad) 1 to obtain an image of a portion of the work surface as an analog signal. The A/D converter 22 converts the analog signal image provided from the image sensor 21 into digital data recognizable by the movement value calculator 23 of the optical mouse 2.
The movement value calculator 23 receives a sample image transmitted from the A/D converter 22, obtains a correlation of position between the sample image and the previously sampled image, calculates a movement value of the optical mouse 2 responding to the correlation, and transmits the calculated movement value to the communication part 25.
The button part 24 includes a plurality of mechanical buttons, each of which generates a corresponding button selection signal in response to a button push operation of a user.
Therefore, the optical mouse 2 in FIG. 1 can provide the same number of button selection signals as the number of mechanical buttons. That is, when the button part 24 includes eight mechanical buttons, the optical mouse 2 can provide eight button selection signals to the computer.
The communication part 25 is an interface device such as a universal serial bus (USB) or a personal system/2 (PS/2), which interfaces data between the computer 3 and the optical mouse 2 according to a USB or PS/2 protocol.
Specifically, when a movement value or a button selection signal is received, the communication part 25 converts it into data having a data format according to the USB or PS/2 protocol to transmit the data to the computer 3. When the data having a data format according to the USB or PS/2 protocol is received, the communication part 25 obtains control data from the received data to process the control data.
Then, each function of the components of the computer 3 will be described.
The communication part 31 is an interface device such as a USB or PS/2, similarly to the communication part 25 of the optical mouse 2, which also interfaces data between the computer 3 and the optical mouse 2.
Specifically, when data having a data format according to a USB or PS/2 protocol is received from the optical mouse 2, the communication part 31 transmits a movement value or a button selection signal of the received data to the main controller 32, and when control data from the main controller 32 is received, the communication part 31 converts the control data into the data having a data format according to the USB or PS/2 protocol to transmit the data to the optical mouse 2.
The main controller 32 is a device such as a central processing unit (CPU) for controlling the general operation of the computer, which sets commands for executing specific operations or application programs corresponding to the plurality of button selection signals provided by the optical mouse 2. When the button selection signal of the optical mouse 2 is received through the communication part 31, the computer executes a command set to the button selection signal to execute a specific function or a specific application program. When the movement value of the optical mouse 2 is received through the communication part 31, the computer 3 moves a pointer displayed on a screen.
As described above, in the conventional optical pointing system, the optical mouse includes mechanical buttons to provide a button selection signal corresponding to a pushed button when a user pushes a specific button to the computer, and the computer executes a command set to the button selection signal. Therefore, the user pushes the buttons of the optical mouse to request a specific operation of the computer.
However, since the buttons of the optical mouse shown in FIG. 1 are mechanical buttons, in order to increase the number of button selection signals provided by the optical mouse, the optical mouse should have more number of mechanical buttons.
As a result, in proportion to the number of mechanical buttons included in the optical mouse, the size of the optical mouse was increased, and material and mold costs for forming the mechanical buttons should be increased.
In addition, once the number of buttons of the optical mouse is determined during a product design process, it was difficult to change the number of buttons during the following product manufacturing process.
Here, optical mouse is explained as an example. It is natural to extend to any optical pointing device such as, not limited, optical pen mouse, optical presentation mouse, and optical finger movement navigation device.